F1 teams are currently putting the finishing touches on the design of their 2022 cars ahead of the first pre-season test which will take place in Barcelona, Spain from February 23-25.
The new designs are a complete overhaul of the regulations, with the ground effect challengers aimed at improving racing and closing the grid.
But while it’s too early to make any pecking order predictions, Allison thinks the scale of the rules overhaul makes it inevitable that not everyone will get their new designs.
MORE: Unpacking the technical changes behind the F1 2022 rules overhaul
And he suggests some outfits could face a tough year by getting their interpretation of the new rules wrong.
Speaking in a video from Mercedes which showcases the 2022 rules, Allison said: “Everyone in our team, and everyone in all the other teams, will have done their best to try and come up with a design and a approach that will happily match this. new set of regulations.
“And we will all find out together at the start of this season, in the races that will take place from there, exactly how it goes.
“I imagine, given that the cars are so new and so different, that one or two cars on the grid will have gotten really wrong. And they’re going to have a terribly painful year.
“I imagine we’ll all, to some degree, have left things on the table that we just didn’t anticipate. And we’ll be looking at other cars and thinking, ‘oh, why didn’t we not thought?’
“Then we’ll be scrambling to try and get that idea onto our car as fast as we can, so we can work our way through whatever position we land in that first race, forward. Or, if we are lucky to be in front, to keep the attacking wolves behind us.
“It’s going to be pretty rushed and definitely something that’s going to keep us from oversleeping all season.”
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
While Mercedes has the most to lose from the rule change, having won the constructors’ championship every year since 2014, Allison says the German manufacturer is actually excited about the challenge that has been posed.
“When regulations change to such a significant extent as these, we approach that with all the fun and enjoyment that this challenge deserves,” he said.
“Our job is to research technical opportunities and regulations, and then use our combined minds and skills and all the efforts we collectively make, to try and find a car setup that will be better than anyone’s approach. who else.
“When everything is that new, then everywhere you look in that set of regulations, [which is] twice as thick as the old one, there is opportunity.
“There is an opportunity. And of course there is danger, and we try to make our way through the potential minefield and collect all the little boxes of treasures that can be placed among the landmines, to end up with a car that, we hope will see us pitching at the front of the grid.
